OSAGE BEACH, Mo. — Mark Hugus and Cody Hahner of the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point took the first-round lead Friday in the 2014 Carhartt Bassmaster College Series Midwestern Regional Championship on Lake of the Ozarks and never looked back. The pair claimed the win Saturday with a two-day total of 32 pounds, 13 ounces and a comfortable 5-pound, 9-ounce winning margin.

The runner-up team of Cody Lincoln and Jason Hawksford, also of the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, ended the tournament with a total of 27-4.

Although the Top 14 teams earned the right to move on to the Carhartt College Series National Championship, qualifying was never the focus for Hugus and Hahner.

“We came here to win,” said Hahner. “We finished second at our tournament last weekend, and that hurt.”

When Hugus and Hahner hit the water for practice at the Missouri lake, their main focus was finding big bass. The bigger bites were spaced out during practice so the duo searched for different fishing areas during the competition days, as well. They also concentrated on a few areas where they had previously caught multiple fish.

Their win can be credited to covering water and not letting lost fish demoralize them. On Friday, Hugus and Hahner lost a 3-pounder and another bass weighing more than 5 pounds early in the morning. Knowing that their main window of opportunity would come later in the day as the water warmed up, they were able to shake off the lost fish and focus on the next bite.

Day 2 began much the same way with Hugus losing the team’s second keeper bite of the morning, a solid 4-pounder.

“We just kept our heads down and kept fishing,” said Hugus.

That mindset paid off as Hugus and Hahner hit a flurry around noon when they boated most of their 13-3 catch on Saturday during a 30-minute span.

Lincoln and Hawksford, who finished in second, also held the second-place position on Day 1.

Kansas State University’s Quinn Fowler and Dylan McKee finished third with 26-3.

Ryan Gilbert and Jacob Cllisch of the University of Wisconsin-Plattville caught the Carhartt Big Bass for the event, a 7-1 largemouth that Gilbert weighed in on Friday. The prize was a $500 Carhartt gift card.

Hugus and Hahner took the Livingston Lures Leader Award of a $500 gift card with a two-day total of 32-13. The two also won the Bass Pro Nitro Big Bag award with their first-day catch of 19-10 and received a $250 Bass Pro Shops gift card.

The Top 14 teams advance to the Carhartt College Series National Championship to be held later this year.

ROGERS, Ark. (March 28, 2014) – The fourth event in the 19th season of the major leagues of professional bass-fishing, the Walmart FLW Tour, kicks off April 10-13 with the Walmart FLW Tour at Beaver Lake presented by Rayovac. Hosted by the Rogers Convention and Visitors Bureau, the tournament will feature a full field of the world’s best bass-fishing pros and co-anglers casting for top awards of up to $125,000 cash in the pro division and up to $25,000 cash in the co-angler division.

“I always look forward to going back to Beaver Lake,” said Walmart pro Mark Rose of West Memphis, Ark., an eight-time Forrest Wood Cup qualifier. “This tournament is going to be very different than our past few visits.”

The differences that Rose speaks of include the delayed bass spawn, and a rule change implemented by FLW in 2014 that bans the use of umbrella rigs on the FLW Tour.

“It’s been a really cold winter and in past seasons the fish would already be spawning,” Rose said. “The lake is so far behind right now that I’m predicting that this event will be a pre-spawn tournament.

“Not being able to throw an umbrella rig is definitely going to be a factor in this tournament,” Rose continued. “That bait and that profile really seems to catch the upper-class fish that are in Beaver Lake. It really showed off the quality of fish that live there. But, with the new rules, I think we may see a return to the days where catching 10 pounds is a pretty good day.”

Normal Beaver Lake pre-spawn tactics are expected to be employed by the tournament anglers. Jigs, jerkbaits, spinnerbaits, Storm Wiggle Warts, swimbaits and shaky-head rigs are all expected to be popular baits thrown.

In FLW Tour competition, anglers are also vying for valuable points in hopes of qualifying for the 2014 Forrest Wood Cup, the world championship of bass fishing. The 2014 Forrest Wood Cup will be in Columbia, S.C., Aug. 14-17 on Lake Murray and is hosted by Capital City Lake Murray Country. Anglers could win as much as $500,000 – professional bass-fishing’s richest prize.

Anglers will take off from Prairie Creek Park Marina located at 9300 N. Park Road in Rogers at 7 a.m. each day of competition. Thursday and Friday’s weigh-ins will be held at Prairie Creek Park beginning at 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday’s final weigh-ins will be held at the John Q. Hammons Center located at 3303 Pinnacle Hills Parkway in Rogers beginning at 4 p.m.

Raymer and Snyder may have been fishing their first College Fishing event as a team, but together they carried years of experience into the first Central Conference event of the season. The pair threw an umbrella rig better than any other team in the field en route to picking up the Eastern Kentucky University bass club’s 15th top-5 finish, and their fourth win.

“We were throwing umbrella rigs on sloping main-lake points with basketball-sized rock and standing timber that had channel swings right next to them,” explained Snyder. “We probably had the boat in 20 to 30 feet of water, and our fish were coming out of 12 to 16 feet of water.”

“During our pre-fish we caught a lot of scattered fish, so we had a lot of spots to check,” said Raymer. “We only had one little spotted bass in the boat when Ethan (Snyder) caught our big one at about 11 o’clock. We blew off and then pulled back around to that same spot and I caught our second biggest.”

“We’re extremely excited to be able to go fish the Invitational at Kentucky Lake,” finished Raymer. “The only bad thing about it is that September is a tough time to fish Kentucky Lake. I don’t know what to expect, but I know we’ll put in as much time as we can and try to qualify for the National Championship.”

The team said they used umbrella rigs with blades and Strike King Shadalicious Swimbaits to catch their fish.

FLW College Fishing teams compete in three qualifying events in one of five conferences – Central, Northern, Southern, Southeastern and Western. The top 15 teams from each regular-season tournament will qualify for one of five conference invitational tournaments. The top 10 teams from each conference invitational tournament will advance to the 2015 FLW College Fishing National Championship.

College Fishing is free to enter. All participants must be registered, full-time undergraduate students at a four-year college or university and members of a fishing club recognized by their college or university.

BAINBRIDGE, Ga. — Brett Hite is 1-for-1.
Sunday, Hite won the first Bassmaster Elite Series event in
which he competed, the Dick Cepek Tires Bassmaster Elite at Lake
Seminole presented by Hardee’s.
The Phoenix, Ariz., pro’s name is now alongside Derek Remitz’s
in the history books as the only Elite Series rookies who have
walked away with the trophy in their debut events.
Hite’s prize was $100,000 and an automatic berth in the 2015
Bassmaster Classic on Lake Hartwell in South Carolina.
“I’m pretty excited because Lake Hartwell is one of my favorite
lakes,” Hite said. “Going into this season, getting to the
Classic on Lake Hartwell was a goal. But I’m still going into
the rest of the season by putting my head down and practicing
hard and fishing hard.”
With a four-day total of 97 pounds, 10 ounces, Hite’s margin of
victory was a whopping 13-0 over the runner-up, Todd Faircloth
of Jasper, Texas, who posted a total of 84-10.
Ending up in third at 80-9 was Mark Davis of Mount Ida, Ark.
Fourth place was taken by the 2004 Classic champion, Takahiro
Omori of Emory, Texas, with 78-4. Finishing fifth was Kevin
Short of Mayflower, Ark., with 76-6.
To take his win, Hite targeted hefty female prespawners staging
along stretches of grassy banks. With his boat positioned in 6
to 8 feet of water, he was close enough to the bank to have been
able to cast and hit it. He cast to the edge of the grass.
The fact that these spots replenished daily, and that he
managed the use of those spots well, were keys to his daily
weights: 24-11 on Day 1, which was good for fourth place; 20-11
on Day 2, when he took the lead; 26-5 on Day 3 when he led the
field again, then 25-15 on Day 4.
The icing on his final day was hooking into a 7-13.
“I set the hook, and I was thinking, ‘Man, I hope this isn’t a
tree.’ Then I saw my line coming toward me. It was the biggest
fish I’d caught all week, and it came at the right time. It was
pretty special,” he said. “I just knew that was the dagger.”
Hite achieved his hefty final-round weight despite a short
competition day. A heavy storm front approaching the lake
prompted Bassmaster officials to bring the 12 finalists off the
water at 1 p.m. ET instead of 3:45.
Hite’s go-to lure all four days was a Z-Man ChatterBait, a
bladed swim jig, in 3/8- and 1/2-ounce sizes depending on
whether the grass was low or high in the water column. He said
he caught most of his bass on the green pumpkin color, but he
also used black-and-blue version in the morning or to give the
bass something new to look at.
His trailer was usually a 4 1/2-inch swimming Gary Yamamoto
Senko trailer in either green pumpkin with a dyed chartreuse
tail, or in black-and-blue.
Although technically a Bassmaster Elite Series rookie, Hite has
a 13-year history of competing in major tournaments. His Sunday
victory was No. 2 for him in as many months; he won in Florida
last month on another circuit.
Hite’s 2015 Classic qualification is his third. He competed in
the 2000 Classic, qualifying through what was then the Western
Invitational series and again in 2004 through the Top 150 tour
before the Elite Series was created in 2006.
“The Classic is the biggest tournament in the world,” he
said. “And the time period of the Classic (February) is when I
excel, during the prespawn. I’m looking forward to it.”
Bonuses earned at the Lake Seminole event include:
* Carhartt Big Bass of the tournament, worth $1,000 plus
another $500 for wearing Carhartt apparel: Bernie Schultz for
his 10-10 on Day 1.
* Berkley Heavyweight Award of $500 for the best five-fish
limit: Shaw Grigsby for his 30-5 on Day 1.
* Toyota’s $1,000 bonus to the leader in the Toyota Bassmaster
Angler of the Year points race: Brett Hite
* Livingston Lures Leader Award of $500 for heading up the
leaderboard on the second day: Brett Hite.
Courtesy of BASS Communications.

Texan Redington Wins Co-Angler Title, $25,000
SENECA, S.C. (March 9, 2014) – Pro angler Casey Ashley of
Donalds, S.C., brought the largest stringer to the scale on
Sunday – for the third time in four days of competition – to win
the Walmart FLW Tour at Lake Hartwell presented by Ranger Boats.
Ashley weighed in a five-bass limit worth 15 pounds, 10 ounces
to win the $100,000 prize after leading wire-to-wire in the four-
day event that showcased 176 of the best bass-fishing
professionals in the world.
Ashley’s four-day total of 20 bass weighing 68 pounds, 5
ounces gave him an impressive 14-pound, 8-ounce margin of
victory over second-place finisher Livingston Lures pro Andy
Morgan of Dayton, Tenn., whose four-day total of 20 bass weighed
53 pounds, 13 ounces and earned him $30,000.
“This week has been magical,” said Ashley, who earned the
first Walmart FLW Tour victory of his career. “I’m not taking
away from any major tournament that I’ve won, but it really
means a lot to win at home. When you win at home, everybody you
know is here. A lot of times my family gets to travel to my
closer tournaments, but at home everybody gets to be there. A
lot of them were out on the water watching me. I think the whole
town of Donalds is here. It’s just an awesome feeling.”
Ashley said that he concentrated his efforts this week
fishing the lower end of Lake Hartwell in the clear water. He
targeted deep brush piles from 25 to 40 feet deep.
“A lot of the stuff that I was fishing was natural brush,”
Ashley said. “I knew that would hold up well despite the screwy
weather going into this tournament and I felt like that would be
the only way that you can win. Every move that I made this week
was the right one.”
Ashley said that he caught all of his fish this week
throwing a green pumpkin-colored ½-ounce Shooter Lures hand-tied
jig trailered with a Zoom Super Chunk Jr. and a shaky-head rig
with a watermelon candy- or gourd green-colored Zoom Finesse
Worm.
“I caught around 10 fish today,” Ashley continued. “I
didn’t catch many because I was running some new stuff trying to
catch big fish. I ended up catching my 4-pounder where I’d been
fishing all week. When I got the big one, I knew it was game
over.”
The top 10 pros finished the tournament in:
1st: Casey Ashley, Donalds, S.C., 20 bass, 68-5
2nd: Livingston Lures pro Andy Morgan, Dayton,
Tenn., 20 bass, 53-13
3rd: Clent Davis, Montevallo, Ala., 19 bass, 50-9
4th: Repel pro Cody Meyer, Auburn, Calif., 19
bass, 49-14
5th: John Cox, Debary, Fla., 16 bass, 48-14
6th: Brett Hite, Phoenix, Ariz., 18 bass, 46-14
7th: Chevy pro Anthony Gagliardi, Prosperity,
S.C., 18 bass, 43-15
8th: George Foreman pro Dan Morehead, Paducah,
Ky., 13 bass, 43-14
9th: Ryan Davidson, Huntington, W. Va., 16 bass,
41-4
10th: Charlie Ingram, Centerville, Tenn., 16 bass,
40-2
Overall there were 41 bass weighing 98 pounds, 15 ounces
caught by pros Sunday. Five of the final 10 pros caught five-
bass limits.
David Redington of Sulphur Springs, Texas, won the co-
angler division and $25,000 Saturday with a three-day total of
10 bass weighing 31 pounds, 8 ounces, followed by Todd Lee of
Jasper, Ala., in second place with 13 bass weighing 30 pounds,
15 ounces worth $7,500.
Pros competed for a top award of up to $125,000 this week
plus valuable points in the hope of qualifying for the 2014
Forrest Wood Cup presented by Walmart, the world championship of
bass fishing. The top 35 anglers in the point standings from the
six events on the 2014 Walmart FLW Tour will qualify. The 2014
Forrest Wood Cup will be in Columbia, S.C., Aug. 14-17 on Lake
Murray and is hosted by Capital City Lake Murray Country.
Anglers could win as much as $500,000 – professional bass-
fishing’s richest prize.
Courtesy of FLW Outdoors.